Amaretti di Saronno pffft

I bought a box to introduce the new generation to the lit paper trick, but they will not fly!
One website says, "We all light them and the one that flies is good luck."
Another "will not comment."
Years ago, every paper wrapper rolled in a tube, placed on a dessert plate, and lit would form a beautiful "cage" of flame that made a funnel of heat to send the last bit of flaming paper into the air.
So far this year, zero out of seven. I have lost heart!

Functional Family 2013 Xmas

Dysfunctional families get all the press.
We pulled together and got Christmas tree cutting, great meals, downing of a pine tree shading the garden, a bonfire, and carol singing as well as the stockings and presents.
I was angling for an outing - dancing with my creative family, but in the Berkshires, venues seem to be holding off until New Year's Eve.
A family trek to Middle-Earth, the new Hobbit movie, in 3 D, happened at 5 PM yesterday, but Joe had his tennis, so we went back to Falmouth and 3D in Mashpee for us.
Luckily, I got a dancing evening after all. After all that hanging around the house, I was ready!

Merrily we roll along

"Over the canal and through Massachusetts
to Great-big Grandma's we go.
I was ready at 9:30,
but Joe had to go to town-oh!"

Hopefully we'll find dancing on Friday - my sibs are usually up for that sort of thing.

The little boy

He's two. Maybe because of a bad cold? -he did not want to dance.
A freezing day, so we weren't going out, but we always need to move, so I put on the music that his sister loved at that age.
I will try again. This is going too far in the gender typing that those two display! Okay that when she got trucks for a present, she played with them by lining them up to watch her perform.
Do I need to choreograph a truck dance?

Fall River Dancing

The old mills in Fall River are full of interesting businesses, Like a downtown or a mall.
I went to Heron Studio on the ground floor with a great dance space run by Jessica, dancer friend of my daughter-in-law. They sublet space for many things - Alice's Solstice Tea Party, Spiritual Guidance, and a huge room full of lovely hydroponic lettuce, Urban Acres. For ballroom classes, only a card directing one to Dancing the Dream in Westport (or maybe Tiverton, according to an internet search)
Ian and I went to the children's library and the music store where harmonicas are priced at $45! The salesman offered me a plastic one for $10, but I pulled out my old battered D flat harmonica and said plastic would not do. Ian is only two, so a C hamonica will be for me to find notes with and try singing - more fun than a pitch pipe.
He liked playing with the drums for a bit. I liked the Latin Beat Box best.
Then it was time to go back to Mama and eat lunch while they finished rehearsing. One dancer is Shura Baryshnikov; you guessed whose daughter she is. Amanda Narisco is Miss Massachusetts. Meghan, who carpooled with me from Sandwich, appeared at the Wianno Club the year Naomi Turner presented a Swing showcase.

Historical Costumes

Putting stuff back in the attic. One goal is to get rid of half.
What about the box of dance costumes - silk chiffon and leotards?
My best clothes from my adult life are costumes now. The dress I made from an Indian bedspread after seeing the movie "Woodstock," stuff that was second-hand when I got it, or from my mother the hoarder's storehouse, clothes that I bought that cost more because China wasn't making all of our clothes, fancy dresses worn once, including the dress my mother-in-law wore at her daughter's wedding, my wedding dress, made by my sister, which fit until I started Pilates and strengthened my back, etc! I could go on and on - maybe I will make a catalog that is a history, tying together the story of my life, sort of like the books that have the recipes.
If I keep all these clothes, I'll have to seriously cull the quilt scraps, much of which are history as well, being pieces from clothes that ripped or got stained.

FACEBOOK takes over much of our connectivity.
I posted a picture of a Hindu Monkey God from my friend from 1970, and then a huge engine from my brother-in-law - sort of balance each other out. Both pretty impressive and funny.
Facebook, another reason to do very few Christmas cards. Mine this year, for those who have kept up the tradition, a re-issue of linoleum block from my first years living on Cape Cod.  Swirls to represent the wind that now was a bigger part of the weather. North wind, especially, in December, but I also think of a 16th century poem (anonymous).
Oh Western wind when wilt thou blow
The small rain down can rain
Christ that my love were in my arms
And I in my bed again.
Before the New Year, I'll find the ones I made as a child and teen. I'm pretty sure I know where they are.
Next year - a retrospective